Magnuson-Stevens Act Provisions; Fisheries of the Northeastern United States; Fisheries of the Northeastern United States; Atlantic Herring Fishery; Adjustment to 2025 Specifications

<RULE> DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE <SUBAGY>National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration</SUBAGY> <CFR>50 CFR Part 648</CFR> <DEPDOC>[Docket No. 241212-0326]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 0648-XE368</RIN> <SUBJECT>Magnuson-Stevens Act Provisions; Fisheries of the Northeastern United States; Fisheries of the Northeastern United States; Atlantic Herring Fishery; Adjustment to 2025 Specifications</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Commerce. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Interim final rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> This interim final rule makes an in-season adjustment to the 2025 Atlantic herring specifications and sub-annual catch limits for the four Atlantic herring management areas (including Area 1A, 1B, 2, and 3). This action is necessary to respond to updated scientific information from a 2024 herring management track stock assessment and achieve the goals and objectives of the Atlantic Herring Fishery Management Plan. This action reduces current 2025 catch limits to lessen the risk overfishing and help rebuild the stock. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> Effective December 19, 2024, through December 31, 2025. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> Copies of supporting documents, including the 2023-2025 Atlantic Herring Specifications, are available from the Sustainable Fisheries Division, Greater Atlantic Regional Fisheries Office, 55 Great Republic Drive, Gloucester, MA 01930, telephone (978) 281-9315, or online at: <E T="03">https://www.nefmc.org/management-plans/herring</E> and <E T="03">https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/species/atlantic-herring#management.</E> <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Carrie Nordeen, Fishery Policy Analyst, 978-281-9272. </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Background</HD> Regulations implementing the Atlantic Herring Fishery Management Plan (FMP) appear at 50 CFR part 648, subpart K. NMFS implemented the 2025 specifications in the 2023-2025 specifications for the Atlantic herring fishery (88 FR 17397; March 23, 2023). The specifications set an overfishing limit (OFL), acceptable biological catch (ABC), annual catch limit (ACL), and sub-ACLs for 2023-2025 for each of the four management areas in the herring fishery, subject to future review and any necessary adjustments. FMP regulations § 648.200(e) state that NMFS may make in-season adjustments to the herring specifications and sub-ACLs to achieve conservation and management objectives, after consulting with the New England Fishery Management Council, during the fishing year in accordance with the Administrative Procedure Act and consistent with FMP objectives and provisions. Amendment 8 to the FMP (86 FR 1810; January 11, 2021) implemented an ABC control rule for the herring fishery. The ABC control rule is a formulaic approach for setting a harvest limit and is designed to balance the goals and objectives of the FMP, including managing the fishery at long-term sustainable levels and accounting for herring's role as forage in the ecosystem. The ABC control rule states that when biomass is at or above 50 percent of the biomass associated with maximum sustainable yield (B <E T="52">MSY</E> ) or its proxy, ABC is the catch associated with a maximum fishing mortality (F) of 80 percent of F <E T="52">MSY</E> or its proxy. When biomass falls below 50 percent of B <E T="52">MSY</E> or its proxy, the allowable F declines linearly to zero at 10 percent of B <E T="52">MSY</E> or its proxy. On October 2, 2020, NMFS determined the Atlantic herring stock was overfished, but overfishing was not occurring. Framework 9 to the FMP (87 FR 42962; July 19, 2022) established a 5-year rebuilding plan for herring with an F consistent with the ABC control rule implemented in Amendment 8. The rebuilding plan was expected to rebuild the stock by 2026, however, the duration of the rebuilding period was extended from 5 years (2026) to 7 years (2028) with implementation of the 2023-2025 herring specifications. A 2024 herring management track stock assessment (2024 stock assessment) was completed in June 2024. According to the results of the 2024 stock assessment, the stock continues to be overfished with overfishing not occurring. Retrospective pattern adjustments were necessary because the model overestimated biomass and underestimated mortality. The adjusted spawning stock biomass was estimated to be 26 percent (47,955 metric tons (mt)) of B <E T="52">MSY</E> and the adjusted F was estimated to be 58 percent (0.263) of the overfishing threshold (F <E T="52">MSY</E> equals 0.45). The 2024 stock assessment was unable to explain a cause for the stock's historic and continued low recruitment and projected that poor recruitment of herring will likely result in a substantial decline in biomass. On July 31, 2024, the Council's Science and Statistical Committee (SSC) reviewed the 2024 stock assessment and recommended harvest limits for 2025-2027. The SSC recommended using the ABC control rule for the OFL and ABC recommendations for 2025-2027, while noting concern for the continued low recruitment and low spawning stock biomass. At its September 2024 meeting, the Council reviewed the 2024 stock assessment and recommended new specifications for 2025-2027. The Council's recommendations are consistent with the ABC control rule and the SSC's recommendations, with the following exception. Catch projections from the 2024 stock assessment allow for harvest limit increases in 2026 and 2027, compared to 2025. However, the Council recommended holding 2026 harvest limits constant for 2027, instead of allowing for projected limit increases. This precautionary measure is intended to lessen the risk of overfishing and support stock rebuilding, while recognizing that 2027 specifications will likely be revised following the 2025 herring research track stock assessment. NMFS intends to implement the 2025-2027 specifications via proposed and final rulemaking as soon as possible, but the 2025-2027 specifications would not be effective in time for the start of the fishing year on January 1, 2025. Catch projections from the 2024 assessment indicate the need for an almost 90-percent reduction from the current 2025 ACL (23,961 mt) to the new, reduced 2025 ACL (2,710 mt). Implementing the reduced 2025 specifications after the start of the fishing year on January 1, 2025, raises a significant risk that catch may exceed the reduced catch limits. Therefore, to ensure the reduced 2025 specifications are in place at the start of the fishing year on January 1, the Council requested that NMFS use an in-season adjustment to reduce the current 2025 specifications and sub-ACLs as soon as possible, and NMFS concurs. The FMP regulations at § 648.201(g) specify that unharvested catch in a herring management area in a fishing year (up to 10 percent of that area's sub-ACL) shall be carried over and added to the sub-ACL for that herring management area for the fishing year following the year when total catch is determined. Preliminary data suggest that 2023 catch levels were substantially lower than allowed in herring management areas 1B and 2. Thus, a percentage of catch underages from 2023 is eligible for carryover to 2025: approximately 54 mt from Area 1B and 346 mt from Area 2. Given the substantial catch reduction needed for 2025 to support the FMP's conservation and management objectives, the Council requested that NMFS use its in-season adjustment authority to nullify any carryover in 2025. NMFS agrees that nullifying any carryover is necessary to lessen the risk of overfishing and to help rebuild the stock. The potential long-term negative effects on the herring stock associated with an increased risk of overfishing and delayed rebuilding outweigh the short-term economic benefits associated with harvesting the available carryover. Therefore, this interim final rule adjusts the 2025 specifications and sub-ACLs consistent with the FMP's goals to lessen the risk of overfishing and help rebuild the stock. The current and reduced 2025 specifications are shown in the table below. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Measures Implemented in This Action</HD> This action reduces 2025 specifications and sub-ACLs consistent with the FMP's goals to lessen the risk of overfishing and help rebuild the stock. The complete 2025-2027 specifications would be implemented via proposed and final rulemaking as soon as possible following the in-season adjustment. The current and new, reduced 2025 specifications are shown in table 1 below. <GPOTABLE COLS="3" OPTS="L2,i1" CDEF="s100,12,12"> <TTITLE>Table 1—In-Season Adjusted 2025 Herring Specifications</TTITLE> <CHED H="1">Specifications</CHED> <ENT I="01">Acceptable Biological Catch</ENT> <ENT>28,181</ENT> <ENT>6,741</ENT> </ROW> <ROW> <ENT I="01">Management Uncertainty Buffer</ENT> <ENT>4,220</ENT> <ENT>4,031</ENT> </ROW> <ROW> <ENT I="01">Optimal Yield/Annual Catch Limit</ENT> <ENT>23,961</ENT> <ENT>2,710</ENT> </ROW> <ROW> <ENT I="01">Domestic Annual Harvest</ENT> <ENT>23,961</ENT> <ENT>2,710</ENT> </ROW> <ROW> <ENT I="01">Border Transfer</ENT> <ENT I="01">Domestic Annual Processing</ENT> <ENT>23,961</ENT> <ENT>2,710</ENT> </ROW> <ROW> <ENT I="01">US At-Sea Processing</ENT> <ENT I="01">Area 1A Sub-ACL (28.9%)</ENT> <ENT>6,925</ENT> <ENT>783</ENT> </ROW> <ROW> <ENT I="01">Area 1B Sub-ACL (4.3%)</ENT> <ENT>1,030</ENT> <ENT>117</ENT> </ROW> <ROW> <ENT I="01">Area 2 (27.8%)</ENT> <ENT>6,661</ENT> <ENT>753</ENT> </ROW> <ROW> <ENT I="01">Area 3 (39%)</ENT> <ENT>9,345</ENT> <ENT>1,057</ENT> <TNOTE>* If New Brunswick weir landings are less than 2,722 mt through October 1, then 1,000 mt will be subtracted from the management uncertainty buffer and r ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 18k characters. 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